Tuesday 3 July 2007

Happy Birthday Canada

On 1 July, CANADA DAY, Canada celebrated it's 140th Birthday

Happy Birthday Canada!
And Canada Day weekend means it's Strawberry Festival time. All good Festivals start with a Strawberry Parade to kick off the festivities....


Of course, a Strawberry Festival has to have lots and lots of strawberries...

But you can't live on strawberries alone. Here I'm enjoying falafel from the Egyptian Coptic Church booth.

The Space Cadet couldn't resist joining in with the cowgirl Line Dancers on the street. He got a well deserved standing ovation from the crowd.

And of course, there were rides on the Berry-Go-Round...

119 people signed up for the Grand Whistle-Off.... an attempt to get into the Guinness Book of World Records for the most people whistling the same tunes at the same time. I helped out by volunteering as one of the Registrars... it all has to be official for the Guinness people. We whistled O Canada, Frere Jaques, Col. Bogey's March, Onward Christian Soldiers, Amazing Grace, Take Me Out To The Ball Game, and finished with O Canada (French version). Have you ever whistled in French? It's not easy. let me tell ya!
There were lots of fresh ripe Strawberries for sale...

and entertainment by the Family Quarles in the big tent...

No Festival is complete without a dog show.....

..... and a crazy Chinese magician who can pull a white rabbit out of a hat!

Canada Day ended with a 4 man parachute jump, and an accurate landing in the main baseball diamond.
And then Canada Day cake for everyone, spectacular fireworks, and the rest of the evening grooving to the sounds of The Blackboard Blues Band in the big tent.
Happy Birthday Canada..... and Happy July 4th to all my American blogger friends!

22 comments:

  1. Happy Belated Birthday Canada.
    What a fun looking festival and for my favorite fruit at that.
    I can barely whistle in "English", let alone French.

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  2. Awesome photos!! We had a small strawberry festival here last month but it wasn't really stawberry season yet due to the cold winter we had.

    The space cadet looked like he had fun. :-)

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  3. nice series, a strawberry festival sounds like a good idea, great colors too!

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  4. Sounds like fun. Like the dog. Is it a husky? As I write this, my border collie is playing in the flooded lawn. Terrible, terrible rain today and my poor garden is flooded. Heart breaking. All my flowers are floating away! Badger the dog is enjoying herself though. Scaredy Cat is still on top of the wardrobe and refuses to get his feet wet!

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  5. Yay Canada!! I'm so glad that our birthday's are so close together! It's so fun to celebrate together. :)

    Your photos are fantastic. I was grinning the whole time and made all of them bigger to see all the details. It just looks like so much fun. I love food festivals...although I'm not sure if i've ever been to one now that I think of it. There's a show on the Food Network called...(I had to look it up) "All American Festivals" and I used to watch it all the time.

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  6. Wow! Looks like a good day was had by all!! Strawberries & cream, a favourite of mine. Mmmmmm.

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  7. To whistle in French OK, but never tried with the Canadian accent!

    You seem to have had a great fiesta!!

    I trust the strawberries were good? Here with the lousy weather we have had the last two months, all kinds of seasonal berries and fruits are not at the best!

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  8. An amazing set of photographs on your Canada day and I must say, I love strawberry short cake from the days of the 1940s. Mother would bake a cake (not sure what kind but it was white) and then she whipped real cream and we ate until we almost got sick. Glorious days long gone.

    Thanks for your visit to my blog.

    Abraham Lincoln
    Brookville Daily Photo

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  9. Looks like fun was had by all ;-) Especially the Space Cadet...

    Happy Birthday Canada!

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  10. Don't know any one who has touched a golg club, so Helaow !! and a big shake hands.

    Thank you ! you know for what.

    Oh such lovely pictures here, in the picture of the family band, i think two of them are identical twins ? Oh i would have loved to sit there listen to their music, traditional folk, Irish and Scottish. Hope they come out with an album and become famous.
    Its really good to see people enjoying themselves. It makes me happy, early in the morning here in India, Haven't brushed my teeth yet and i am happy.
    See how some one sitting tousands of miles away brightens up my day.
    Thank you

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  11. A belated happy birthday to Canada, a country I think about longingly each time I see our U.S. president on TV. (Sigh.)

    Great shots of the strawberry festival, too.

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  12. Well, that all looked like a lot of fun. Especially the strawberries and cream which by happy co-incidence match the colours on the Canadian flag, very appropriate for Canada Day.

    Ms Soup

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  13. looks like a good time had by all. Happy Belated.

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  14. How's the weather with you? Are you having the warm Canadian summers I remember during my brief life in Toronto?
    Badger didn't catch a lobster, but she did come in with a conger eel, but not sure how to cook it, so let it go again.

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  15. sorry i forgot,
    thank you so much for dropping in

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  16. Well, that was a wonderful celebration. It seems a little old fashioned and a lot wonderful, reading about all the events of the day.

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  17. REPLY ALL:
    Yes, it was a great Strawberry Festival weekend. Main Street was closed on Saturday, and lined with stalls selling food, drink, trinkets, shoes, toys, etc etc etc and of course strawberries, and more than 10,000 people came to enjoy the rides, concerts, BBQs, displays, fireworks, and the weather was absolutely perfect. Most people wore red and white (Canada's colours) but the only disappointment as far as I was concerned is that someone stole my two small Canadaian flags that were either side of my front door. I hope he/she had a good Canada Day, and wasn't bothered too much by conscience. (Conscience? What's that?)

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  18. that looks great fun!
    (i love falafal)

    so much of this could have been a festival in England - and so much of it just couldn't!

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  19. Now that's a festival I would enjoy. I love, love strawberries. Looks like it was great fun and the Space Cadet is in fine dancing form.

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  20. I feel guilty calling your handyman hubby the "space cadet," but I wanted to say he looks like he's having a great time. Good form, Sir! Happy belated Canada Day!

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  21. Don't we all just love these festivities around the first week of July! :)

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